Page 76 of Sing with Me

Ivan handed a clipboard to Tristan. “Why don’t you start our prayer request sheet?”

To everyone, Ivan said, “We’re passing around this clipboard, so if you have any prayers, write them down—legibly, please. I’ll type them into our prayer log book and send everyone an email by tomorrow.”

Diehl finished his bagel and coffee, and waited for the next person to introduce himself.

“Benicio Ketteridge. Call me Ben,” he said. “Former chaplain, now helping with the teen ministry at Seaside Chapel. Summer is super busy with many camps, so please pray for us that we’ll be able to minister to the kids and not be weary of doing well.”

“Certainly. Interesting you should mention doing well. That’s our Scripture this morning, which we’ll get to in a minute,” Matt said. “For those of you who don’t know, our youth pastor is leaving us. His mother is ill on Hilton Head, and as the only child, he feels obligated to go home and take care of her in her last days on earth. Therefore Seaside Chapel is offering the position to Ben. Ben’s been praying about this decision for a couple of months.”

A couple of months? Diehl wondered what kind of prayer would be prayed over such a long span of time. What words would one say to God to stretch a prayer across two months?

Diehl decided he needed to know how to pray like that. It seemed to be a battle.

All attention turned to him now as they waited for Diehl to speak.

“As Ivan has said, I’m Brinley’s brother,” Diehl said. “I’m spending the summer on St. Simon’s, so I thought that I should do something useful, like going to church. My two kids are in town right now. One signed up for every imaginable summer camp at Seaside Chapel, and the other has zero interested in attending anything.”

“What are your kids’ names?” Benicio asked.

“Elisa and Ethan Brooks.”

“Cousins to Petra and Zachary Brooks?” Benicio asked, but he already knew the answer.

Diehl nodded. “Zach is one year older than my Elisa.”

If Parker’s kids weren’t out of town at the moment, Diehl would get them together with Elisa and Ethan. Perhaps the older cousins might provide some Christian influence for his kids.

When he had been single, he hadn’t thought about how important it would be for children to be in safe zones, but now that he was a dad to two growing kids, he worried about who might influence them, how their future might look, and whether God would protect them when he wasn’t around.

Diehl was convinced more than ever that he made the right decision to take them to church.

Thanks to Skye, once again.

After Ivan finished praying, all the coffee was gone, and Matt began his Bible lesson for the day.

“Would someone please read Galatians 6:9 and another person read Galatians 6:10?” Matt asked.

Benicio put up his hand. “Galatians 6:9. ‘And let us not be weary in well doing: for in due season we shall reap, if we faint not.’ That’s what I read this morning. How did you know, Matt?”

Matt shrugged. “It’s been on my mind for a while. God worked it out for today, didn’t He?”

Everyone nodded.

Diehl wondered how God worked it out. He assumed that because God was all-powerful, He could do anything He wanted.

If so, why…

Why had God let Isobel’s car fly over the cliff?

Why had she driven the Pagani so fast?

“What is due season?” Matt asked. “Anyone take a guess?”

“That’s in God’s timing,” Tristan said. “When we do good to others, we know we’re going to reap a reward, but we may not know when.”

“Exactly,” Matt said. “It could be here on Earth. It could be in heaven. We don’t know when. However, we shall see the reward if we don’t faint. What is fainting? Passing out. So let’s stay awake, work hard, serve the Lord, and not faint in the day of distress. Comments? Questions?”

No one said anything.

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